Prejudice concerning size and muscular mass.

So to make a short story about what I'm gonna ask, here's afunny thing that happened to me last Friday.

I was at school, talking with a chick I met there about random stuff, just getting to know each others, when we started talking about our previous weekend, I was telling her about a funny little story that happened when one of my drunken friend ,who decided to take some heavy stuff too, just decided to run off the main street in my city. We were confused( we were fucking wasted too.) and just decided to follow him at our regular pace, when we came across him, he was circled by maybe 4 or 5 meat heads gym humpers. My friend was just, staring straight ahead, not even realising what was happening. He was stoned and drunk as ****, so he didn't even realise what the hell was happening. These guys, they were just insulting him, trying to get him to respond or fight them, when me and 2 of my other friends arrived. As soon as I was at range, the guys started telling us how stupid and gay my friend looked and invited us to laugh at him too, they didn't realise we were his friends. Tehn, I asked my friend if he was alright and as soon as I did that, these guys started leaving. I don't know if they were scared or just unable to back up anything they wanted to do, but they just left.

So after I'm done with this story, I tell her how happy I am that it didn't turn into a fight. I really don't like street fights for obvious reasons, but I'm not scared of anybody. Not meaning that I'd take on 10 people at once, but simply saying that I don't see the use of being scared of people when there are ample solutions to solve problems without violence. As of now, I've been in a good share of dangerous situations, but because I remained calm and also probably because of a lot of luck, I've never been forced to defend myself. Then this girl just look at me and in a perfectly "that's obvious" kind of tone, she drop this gem: "Well that's normal, considering your size, I'd be scared to fight too!"

Sorry for this TL;DR, so here's the question: Has it ever happened to you, back in your puny size age or in recent times, that someone just dropped one of these marvelous gems of stereotypes at you because you are not a Hulking piece of manhood. this got me angry because why the hell should size matter when it comes to personal fears? I understand that many small guys are dead afraid of fighting because they are small, but why should everybody assume that when you're in the featherweight range that automatically you should be afraid of anybody that is bigger than you?

Alternative question: why should body size automatically make you fear everybody? I know of many people that are not even fighters and despise fighting but still don't fear anybody because fearing people is fucking stupid!

Because when two people of similar skill clash the bigger guy usually comes out on top. Prudence would suggest that a smaller person avoid fights. I understand though, I'm about 5 foot seven and a half I think, not sure exactly and I had to stand up to some 6 foot 5 mother last night when my cousin was being a drunken tool. The guy kinda looked like Anderson Silva, it was weird. Anyways, I understand it can suck, but really it is just logical. Courage and skill come in many forms, but generally it isn't smart to pick fights with the big dogs. You shoulda punched that girl though, just on principles.

Most people just assume that size is all that matters when fighting man... They think " Oh my god that guy is big! he must be really tough and a bad ass fighter " Because they don't know better... Obviously size matters but its not impossible for a little guy to beat a big guy that has less skill.

Did you proceed to tell the girl that you are a martial artist and prove it by breaking a baseball bat with your shin in front of her to prove that you could fight? Then when she said that everybody could do it did you go and walked up to the nearest 250+ pounds guy and flying omoplatae'd him to further emphasize your point... and make her fall in love with you and your D3ad1y skills?

I feel your pain man. First day of freshman year I didn't get a lot of sleep the day before, I was 5'5-5'6, skinny, had long hair, said random ****, and brought 2 sandwiches to school. I could barely keep my eyes open and everyone thought I was a fucking stoner for the whole semester. Now everyone just says I have a "natural high". Not sure if that has anything to do with being skinny but I always thought it did. As for confrontations, my friends defended me until they realized I had a black belt. It doesn't mean **** to me but now people think I'm a ninja just because I can do a tornado kick.

Because when two people of similar skill clash the bigger guy usually comes out on top. Prudence would suggest that a smaller person avoid fights. I understand though, I'm about 5 foot seven and a half I think, not sure exactly and I had to stand up to some 6 foot 5 mother last night when my cousin was being a drunken tool. The guy kinda looked like Anderson Silva, it was weird. Anyways, I understand it can suck, but really it is just logical. Courage and skill come in many forms, but generally it isn't smart to pick fights with the big dogs. You shoulda punched that girl though, just on principles.

Yeah I understand that, it always make sense, being in Martial Arts, I know that size and wight does make a huge deal of difference, especially in self defense MA like Jiu Jutsu( not that it makes more difference than normal brawls), but what bothers me is just the stereotype in itself that just because I'm featherweight should mean that I couldn't get myself out of a difficult fight. I'm not stupid enough to get myself in a fight with a guy who is 50 pounds over me, but I'm pretty sure that if it had to happen, I could manage myself pretty well, might not win, but I wouldn't cower and I wouldn't give it up so easily. That might just be because I'm a Martial Artist and after a few years, I've inevitably grown a bit cocky when it comes to fighting, but I do understand that it's not written on my forehead and that ,to the eyes of anybody else around me, I'd just look like your average slim guy who wouldn't be too much trouble to take care off. It still annoy me, though, to hear such things. I've fought many years to get rid of all these fears in order to become a better person and a better fighter, so hearing people assuming that I'm still scared strikes a nerve.

Originally Posted by Jcbal93

Most people just assume that size is all that matters when fighting man... They think " Oh my god that guy is big! he must be really tough and a bad ass fighter " Because they don't know better... Obviously size matters but its not impossible for a little guy to beat a big guy that has less skill.

Did you proceed to tell the girl that you are a martial artist and prove it by breaking a baseball bat with your shin in front of her to prove that you could fight? Then when she said that everybody could do it did you go and walked up to the nearest 250+ pounds guy and flying omoplatae'd him to further emphasize your point... and make her fall in love with you and your D3ad1y skills?

If you did you are my hero.

Not only did I do that, but I also Triangle Choked the teacher just for the heck of it, then the rest of the class started praising me for my immense girth and started throwing money at me!

No seriously, I responded a bit harshly at first, asking " why should I be scared of anyone?" then apologized for my harsh reply and explained her that I didn't really understood "being scared" of people just for their size. We, then, passionately kissed in front of everyone, then everybody praised me for my immense girth and started throwing money at me!

IHZ. Dood. That girl was challenging you. And apparently you even backed down from that. What the ****, man?

Seriously, though, what kind of featherweight are you? I used to weigh in at 145, 150 lbs at 5'7-8", and I put on 40 lbs of muscle (and yeah, 10 of fat, **** you i'm not giving up my stouts and hefeweizen) in a bit over a year. If you've got a slim, effeminate frame - well, sucks to be you unless you like picking up guys, but otherwise eat some protein and do some real exercise.

Judo. I mean hard Judo too. Working out with real competitors and doing uchikomi until you can't feel your forearms and mat drags until your wrists fall off and nagekomi until your whole body aches and newaza until your neck is a mass of scrapes from chokes and tachiwaza until you have bruises all over your back and legs.

Weightlifting. I hate it and didn't have to, but it is honestly the most direct route for what you want.

Other ****. I don't know. Pick something that makes you feel weak, and fragile - because you ARE - and do it until you aren't weak and a goddamn twig.

Putting on muscle isn't hard. Eat right, and eat a lot of it, and get some honest hard work in, and you'll get bigger.

EDIT: Oh, and this "big guy ****"? I dunno, maybe you weren't coming off as confident to the girl as you are trying to here. I suggest you enter open weight divisions at grappling tournaments until you win several and get some real confidence. Or just do Judo competitions. My first tournament in Judo, rather than jits, was last weekend and they stuck a 270lb wrestler in the "198 and under" division, presumably just to **** with us. Guess what? I tossed him, because I'm not a fucking twig any more or he would have smashed me (and apparently I can throw people with uki otoshi, I didn't know that before saturday).

Originally Posted by Ninnong

I feel your pain man. First day of freshman year I didn't get a lot of sleep the day before, I was 5'5-5'6, skinny, had long hair, said random ****, and brought 2 sandwiches to school. I could barely keep my eyes open and everyone thought I was a fucking stoner for the whole semester. Now everyone just says I have a "natural high". Not sure if that has anything to do with being skinny but I always thought it did. As for confrontations, my friends defended me until they realized I had a black belt. It doesn't mean **** to me but now people think I'm a ninja just because I can do a tornado kick.

Your black belt don't mean ****, kid. Hope you take that to heart before you learn it the hard way.

IHZ. Dood. That girl was challenging you. And apparently you even backed down from that. What the ****, man?

Seriously, though, what kind of featherweight are you? I used to weigh in at 145, 150 lbs at 5'7-8, and I put on 40 lbs of muscle (and yeah, 10 of fat) in a bit over a year. If you've got a slim, effeminate frame - well, sucks to be you unless you like picking up guys, but otherwise eat some protein and do some real exercise.

Judo. I mean hard Judo too. Working out with real competitors and doing uchikomi until you can't feel your forearms and mat drags until your wrists fall off and nagekomi until your whole body aches and newaza until your neck is a mass of scrapes from chokes and tachiwaza until you have bruises all over your back and legs.

Weightlifting. I hate it and didn't have to, but it is honestly the most direct route for what you want.

Other ****. I don't know. Pick something that makes you feel weak, and fragile - because you ARE - and do it until you aren't weak and a goddamn twig.

Putting on muscle isn't hard. Eat right, and eat a lot of it, and get some honest hard work in, and you'll get bigger.

Your black belt don't mean ****, kid. Hope you take that to heart before you learn it the hard way.